


If this is the last dance (Then save it for me baby)

by KeepGoing



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Cancer, Derek returns, F/M, Graphic Depictions of Illness, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multiple POV's, Multiple chapter fic, Slow Burn, everyone takes care of stiles, first person pov's, no one dies, pack!feels, sick!fic, the power of human love, unrequited feelings, warning: sickness
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-13
Updated: 2016-08-15
Packaged: 2018-07-23 19:16:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 21,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7476522
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KeepGoing/pseuds/KeepGoing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>I watched as Stiles' friends sat at his side day after day. I watched his father hold his hand and fall asleep next to his bed, instead of going home to sleep. I watched the people who loved him the most, hold his bedpan in front of him so he could vomit into it and help him into the shower when he was too weak to do it himself. I watched Lydia read to him until he fell asleep. I watched Scott shave his head because his best friend had to. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>I watched love engulf a barely turned 18-year-old boy over and over until sometimes it was almost too much for me to take. </i>
</p><p>
  <i>And the day I saw Derek Hale walk into that hospital I knew the walls of that establishment were not going to be able to contain the amount of love that boy was about to be wrapped in.</i>
</p><p>Told from multiple POV's of the pack as they all come to realize in their own ways what matters most in this world, what true love really means, and how much the power of that love can overcome when something non-supernatural threatens to take one of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> If you are triggered by illness, hospital settings, radiation, surgery, detailed descriptions of vomiting and illness, please do not read any further.
> 
> I don't know if there is another fic out there like this. I'm sure there are many where Stiles does end up getting sick like his mother. The ones I have come across are usually from Derek or Stiles POV. But I really wanted to write a fic based on EVERYONE'S emotions about if this happened to Stiles. Werewolves, Banshees, and human emotions. What if nothing supernatural could save Stiles? What if it was just science and doctors and a lot of waiting around? How would each character react to watching one of their own almost die? What would it be like to watch Stiles slowly fall in love with someone other than Lydia? 
> 
> This will be a chapter fic--one chapter every week until its done. When it will be done I do not know. 
> 
> But I hope you take a chance on it. Comments are love.

**Lydia:**

When you have spent the last couple of years being a supernatural psychic of death or whatever the hell someone wants to call me, you get used to the idea that someone, anyone, at any given moment, could die. Another darkness rolls into town and you think, _‘oh, okay. Assemble the pack. We got this’_ but always, in the back of your mind, you know the screams will come. You know your voice will lead the dead into the light or ground or to mars, hell, you have no idea where they go. Just that they do. 

And you’re always the first to know. 

After everything from Eichen and the beast settled down, and Senior year resumed and my heels could be heard in the hallways again, I had a sense of peace for the first time in a long time. I thought, no I knew, something was around the corner, ready to pounce, but I was trying not to think about it much. It could be witches this time. Or more supernatural hybrids. It could be bigfoot for all we knew. But it was going to come. It was only a matter of time. And someone I knew, or God forbid cared about would be taken from this earth. 

So when something simple happens, something non-supernatural, something so...mundane and human, you almost laugh. You almost say out loud ‘How ironic’ but catch yourself because Scott is looking at you with those eyes expecting words of wisdom and encouragement or maybe even tears. I could see the fear in Scott’s eyes as if he was waiting for me to scream any minute. 

But honestly? I felt nothing. No, I take that back. I felt something; I was surprised, but yet not. I was baffled but somehow I knew something like this would happen. I felt sick; maybe it was sympathy pains. I don't know. I couldn't pinpoint what I felt, but it was definitely something. 

But no, I wasn't going to scream. At least not yet. I tried to convince myself of this. Probably because I didn't feel it electrifying every nerve in my body like it normally does when I’m about to unleash my voice. The words that had just flowed from Scott’s mouth, not easily I assure you, invaded my ears and I felt almost...relieved. I hate the way it sounds. Because the news of...God, I can't even say it myself, how the hell did Scott get the horrific job of telling everyone? But I was relieved because one, it wasn't supernatural in nature which just made it so much more...fucking complicated. I had learned to deal with the werewolves and lizards and evil druids and Christ, Peter Hale. But this? Actual science and health and just human crap? That is not something I have been able to handle because I’ve never had to handle it. 

So yeah, I felt relieved because maybe I wouldn't scream if it all went downhill. If he didn't get better. If the doctors couldn't…

It was ironic because, for once, I wouldn't be the one being poked and cut open. I honestly thought when Scott muttered the words “I need to tell you something” that he was going to tell me Jackson was back. Which in all actuality what Scott did tell me was actually easier to deal with than that would have been.

It's not that I don't love Stiles. I do love Stiles. I love Stiles in such a complicated and pure way that I realize the second reason I was relieved was because maybe this would be my chance to save him when he’s constantly saving me. But as soon as that thought invades my head I realize...again...that as relieved as I was that this wasn't supernatural, I know now that because it's not there is no way I can save him. 

There is no magic for this. There are no banshee powers I can push out of my body and into him to save him from a monster or demon or whatever the hell decides to invade our town next. I’m not a doctor. Well, not yet if I decide that's the course of action I want to take in my life. But...I have no way to actually save him like he’s done for me so many times. 

And that's why I have no idea what I was feeling when Scott muttered those words to me. Because so many emotions and thoughts flooded my head in that moment that before I knew it I WAS screaming. It wasn't forced out of me by some cosmic supernatural force. No, my screaming came from the deepest part of my human side. 

Pain. Sadness. Fear for my friend. For the boy, I had grown to...

“Lydia…” Scott ran his tanned fingers through his dark hair. He couldn't look me in the face. He couldn't stand still. His eyes were red from crying. It was bad I knew it. 

“Stiles...he...shit.” Scott sat down on the bench as students brushed past us just trying to get home and on with their lives. I should have been one of those people; I promised my mom we would have dinner together that night and-

“Stiles has a brain tumor.”

And within 15 seconds; with so many new and different thoughts coursing through my mind; I was screaming. 

Look who was the crazy one again. 

Not many people know, but I talk to Allison a lot. Not in the creepy psychic way. I actually go to her grave and bring a blanket and my lunch sometimes and just sit there and talk to her. I tell her about all the things I feel inside myself that I never unload onto anyone else. 

She was the first person I told when I realized how I felt about Stiles. 

It wasn't like in the movies when the feeling hits you like a ton of bricks and it's this beautiful epiphany and the person runs to you in the rain and you vomit out the words you both have been aching to hear for years from one another. 

Real love isn't like that at all. 

Real love hurts like a son of a bitch. Real love digs at you and tears you apart. Real love is sacrifice and pain and years in the making. Real love is when you realize that the boys you had been with before couldn't hold a candle to the kind of MAN Stiles is. What he means to you deep in your heart. How he’s the only one who has ever really seen you. Because that's what Stiles does. He sees. He sees everything. 

So I told Allison and the breeze picked up when the words slip from my lips and before I can thank her for letting me know she is still with me, I looked up to find Scott standing a few feet away; a look of relief and confusion on his face. Relief because thank God he isn't the only one who does this and confusion because he never knew I did. 

And I smiled at him. He stepped forward and that's when my world turned on its axis. 

Derek freaking Hale. 

Derek Hale stood behind Scott, hands deep inside his tight jeans and he looked...different. Yet so much the same as the last time I saw him. He looked taller in a confident way. He was always so tall and strong with his chest out but there was always that slouch he had when he thought no one was looking. But now, he’s taller than ever. He looked peaceful but still scared. It had been almost a year since he took off...and I knew, deep in my soul why he picked to come back to this town now. 

Stiles. 

And I realized in that moment, my hatred and disgust for Derek had nothing to with Peter or Aiden’s death or any of the numerous things I could possibly blame him for. Quite frankly I knew all along none of that was actually Derek’s fault. I couldn't say I hated him or even disliked him. I was a bit indifferent other than the fact he was Peter’s nephew. But the guy did lose his entire family, other than the psychotic uncle in that fire and anyone who was anyone would feel sorry for him. Or fear him. 

I didn't feel either for him. 

But in that moment, I seethed with anger. Because I had made a promise to myself when Scott told me about Stiles that he was going to get better and I was going to tell him how I felt and we could finally start...whatever the hell it was we had been dancing around for so long. I was going to be there for him; hold his hand, bring him food, read to him...I didn't care what. But I was going to show him the human compassion that he had shown me for so long. 

But when I saw Derek’s face, I knew. 

I no longer stood a chance. 

Because Derek wasn't here to help Scott with some supernatural crap that appeared in Beacon Hills. He wasn't here to visit just because he missed this God awful town.

No, he was here for Stiles. 

And if there was one person Stiles would always love more than me, it was Derek. 

I know it sounds crazy. I can hear everyone now. You’re Lydia Martin. Stiles has been in love with you since grade school. Stiles hates Derek. Etc, Etc. But they’d be all wrong. 

Because if there is one person Stiles had saved more than little ol’ me, it's Derek freaking Hale. 

Those first few weeks after Stiles and the rest of us found out about his tumor, were...odd. It was like I was living in two different worlds. Sometimes it was like I was going 100 miles an hour through my day: School, homework, hospital, eat, repeat. And then there were some days that dragged on so long that I thought I was on an endless loop that would never end. 

But no day was better or worse than the last. Because each day was just...horrible. They were giving Stiles radiation to try and shrink the tumor before they operated. Before they opened up his skull, literally, to remove this mass that had formed. Stiles tried joking about it. He tried to say in those first few days that it was all the magical aftershocks from all the stuff that had happened in the past few years. He was really the only human one left and something had to happen to make him different. He tried so hard to laugh about it, to make light of such a horrific ordeal, which was just Stiles’ way. 

But no one was laughing. Not me, not Scott, not his father, not Melissa. No one. 

Not even Isaac that flew back all the way from who knows where just to stand at Stiles hospital bed giving him a pained kicked puppy look he always wore so well. 

“Is that a new scarf?”

Isaac just frowned and muttered an “I’m so sorry, Stiles.”

Stiles told Scott he didn't want Isaac back until he was up for some word sparring they used to do so well. 

But there was nothing funny about what was happening to Stiles. Jubilant, ready for anything, happy and flailing and smiling, always able to keep his sense of humor in the face of imminent danger Stiles, was withering away to nothing due to the radiation. His hair started to fall out in clumps, so Scott shaved it for him and then decided to shave his own head. Stiles smirked at me as I watched them do it in the small hospital bathroom. 

“You gonna take the plunge too, Lyds?”

I just left the room to lean against the wall in the hall and allowed myself to cry.

When Stiles wasn't sleeping, he was throwing up. I tried to get the bucket or the bedpan fast enough to him so he wouldn't vomit on himself, the floor, his bed, or even me or his father sometimes, but it didn't always happen. But I never got grossed out. I never got angry or disgusted. Stiles did. He apologized profusely, which just made me angrier and one time I finally snapped screaming at him that none of this was his fault and I wouldn't be doing this if I didn't love him. 

I thought he’d have been more shocked. He wasn't. He just smiled, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand and told me he loved me too. 

That’s just how Stiles is. 

There wasn't a day I didn't go to the hospital. My mom was concerned for me; that I had no social life, I wasn't dating. It was my senior year. I should be out enjoying myself. But...how could I when one of the core people in my group that I was supposed to be enjoying my senior year with was...no. I wouldn't say it. I refused to say he was dying because he’s not. He wasn't then and he isn't going to. 

So 4 weeks….a month of radiation and the day before his surgery I go to see Allison. And Scott seemed to have the same idea. She comforts us...in different ways, but the result is still the same in the end. Peace. 

I know wherever Allison is she doesn't blame Stiles for anything. 

He gave me a half smile when Scott sat down on my blanket next to me and he brushed his fingertips along Allison’s name. I reached out for his other hand and we intertwined fingers as I kept stealing glances at Derek who was looking up at the sun, squinting his beautiful eyes into it. Yes, I said beautiful. I’m in love with Stiles, not blind. 

I rested my head against Scott’s shoulder and he moves his ear closer to my mouth, because he knew I was going to ask the question. Everyone was going to be asking the question.

“Is Derek…?”

He nodded. “Yeah.”

“Has Stiles seen him yet?”

“No.” Scott paused. “I don’t think so. If he has he hasn’t said anything. Which is typical I guess.”

“Typical for whom? Him or Stiles?”

Scott shrugged. “Both. You know them.”

“But...what if...what will it do to Stiles?”

“What if it helps him? More than we can?”

“Maybe.” I fluffed my skirt out with my free hand. “Maybe not.”

“I think anyone who wants to support Stiles, be there for him, should be able to.”

I nodded and glanced at Derek again. Our eyes met and he gave me the most curious of nods. Like he already knew my feelings and to tell me in that short but sweet nod that he’s just here for support, nothing else. That I had nothing to worry about. 

Derek Hale has always been able to lie to himself, but he couldn’t lie to me.

**Derek:**

I’m not afraid of a lot. I’m not afraid of other werewolves or any other supernatural creature that I have had the pleasure of crossing paths with and/or defeating. Yes, I may get fearful for the people around me, of protecting those close to me, but I myself am never afraid for myself. 

Probably because I haven't been afraid of dying for a long time. 

I wouldn't say I’m suicidal. That’s a human emotion, like many, that I just don't possess. 

There are things I do not understand, which in turn make the people in my life think I am fearful of them. But that’s just not the case. I just...don’t get them. I don’t understand affection or pure love...maybe because I haven't experienced it in so long I have forgotten what it really feels like. I don't feel much of my human side anymore, even when I am around humans that do nothing but secrete emotion from their skin. 

Humans like Stiles. 

I’ve hidden and tucked my human side away for years now and focused on my wolf and using that to protect my land and the people who keep traipsing through it like some kind of amusement park. I’ve used my wolf to guide Scott into becoming a better Alpha than I ever was or could have dreamed of becoming. I used my wolf to protect everything I hold close to me, including my pain. It's all I know. The only human emotion I remember, that I can even stomach possessing is pain. Regret. Guilt. It keeps me alive. It keeps me going. 

It keeps me a wolf in my soul. 

Even after I left Beacon Hills with Braeden, soon realizing Braeden wasn't the kind of girl who could settle in one place long and when the Nevada dirt kicked up underneath her wheels, I didn't feel sadness or loss. It was just one more person in my life who came and went. And I tried to chalk everyone I left back in my hometown up to the same standard. They were there. Then they weren't. 

I did a good job of keeping myself busy with the pack I found on the outskirts of Las Vegas. They were kind and supportive, knowing the Hale name and opening up their land with open arms for me. I helped the younger wolves train, and in a way, I felt like I had finally found a home away from the ashes and the smell of fire. 

Then Scott called. 

One year of radio silence and then one Tuesday night it was like the world began to scream so loudly in my ears that I couldn't hear my own thoughts anymore. 

His words rang through my head like Lydia’s screams. 

“Stiles...he...he’s sick.”

As Scott explained everything; ‘tumor, radiation, surgery, promised his Dad I wouldn't turn him, promised Stiles I wouldn't either…’in that moment I remembered what it felt like to be human. 

Sadness. Fear. Doubt. Sympathy. Need. Want. 

Love.

For the first time since I was a kid, I was afraid. 

I was afraid of losing someone. 

I was afraid that the world would be smaller without him in it. 

That I wouldn't have the comfort of knowing there was someone like Stiles out there in the world. 

My heart ached. 

My skin tingled. 

I felt...that heaviness in my chest as if I might cry for what felt like centuries since I last had. 

And I realized then that I could handle almost anything that you threw at me. If Scott had been calling me to tell me that Peter was back, or there was another darkness circling my home town and he needed me to come protect it with him, die for the cause, I wouldn’t have felt anything but determination and the fight inside me would have burst up and out of me like every other time. 

But in that moment I felt the fear. 

I was afraid. I was afraid of a stupid human disease that I couldn't do a damn thing about. 

I didn't ask why he called me. I didn't need or want to know. I didn't want to know if Stiles had asked him to. I didn't need to know if it was because Scott needed help through this even from an ex-alpha who was sort of responsible for him being bitten, to begin with. 

I didn't ask any of those questions. There were no grand decisions to be made. I didn't ask and he didn't tell me. I just spoke.

“I’ll be there soon.”

He didn't say anything after that, he just hung up. 

27 hours later the “Welcome to Beacon Hills” sign laughed at me as I passed it and I felt that unfamiliar feeling again of fear. 

There is probably a hundred different places I should have gone when I got into town. Scott's, the Sheriff’s department, my loft, but none of those even registered as a place I needed to go. 

I know where I needed to go. 

I wondered if Stiles would tell anyone he saw me. I wondered if I would lie when Scott asked me if I had gone to see him. I could do the usual Derek grunt and tell him it’s none of his business, but the truth was, some things are just meant to be private. And most of the things between Stiles and I have been private. But I’d have been a fool to think that no one had noticed that I cared for Stiles. That those moments I thought had only happened perhaps in my own head couldn’t possibly have been seen by anyone else. But I’d be wrong. 

But I chose in the end not to tell Scott I had gone to see Stiles on my own. It wasn’t my story to tell. It never was when it came to Stiles. 

I expected Melissa Mccall to stop me but she didn't. She looked up at me from behind the nurses station, not even surprised to see me. It was 11 in the morning so I knew no one else would be there. Scott and the rest at school and the sheriff at work. 

There were many places I should have been. But I needed to be there. 

“Room 312.” She whispered knowing I’d hear her. Visitors passes don't pertain to me, and she knew it. 

His door was half open; his own private room with a tv a tad bigger than other rooms and it made me wonder how much this was costing the sheriff on his salary and there was that emotion again. Guilt. Regret. Those I recognize. 

But when I saw Stiles lying there, head buzzed, IV in his arm, skin a gray color and his cheeks emaciated like those third world kids you see on TV that I never really paid attention to because let's admit the truth, I didn't care. But I cared now. Fuck, I cared now. 

And there were the things I feared the most; things I never thought I would have to fear again. 

I was going to lose someone I cared about. 

I could lose Stiles.

His head rolls across his pillow toward me and he doesn't look surprised to see me either, which unnerves me. 

“When all else fails, send in the sour wolf.”

And then I started to cry.

**Melissa:**

Almost everyone I have ever met says the same thing to me. 

“You must be one tough woman to be a nurse.”

I am. I pride myself on my strength and resilience. I pride myself on taking care of my son and our home and helping raise him into a functioning, compassionate, good man. 

Or werewolf. 

Whatever. 

But yes, I need to be strong to be a nurse. I need to put my emotions aside and do my job. I have to watch people die; I can’t help save everyone. 

I meet hundreds of people a day. Some walk out of there smiling, some never walk out again. 

But when it's someone you care about...someone you know…

When I found out Scott was...well...a werewolf...sometimes I still have a hard time saying it, one of the first things that came into my mind after we had sat down and had a nice loooong talk about what it meant and how and why etc, etc, was that I never had to worry about his asthma again. We had a few close calls when he was younger and I knew I would never have to worry about that again.

Yes, I would have to worry about Alpha’s and dark druids and lizard type things and evil spirits...and somehow those things frightened me less than his asthma. Because I wouldn't lose him to some ridiculously human problem. If he got hurt...if he...it would because he was defending his friends, his family, the innocent. Scott was something more powerful than anything I have or ever will experience. He could do anything. Him and his ‘pack.’

And after Allison died...I never thought he would quite recover from that. He barely did. Yes, he found Kira...and then Kira left...and I could always feel it coming from him...that loss...that emptiness where Allison once was. It's not something you just get over. You always hold onto your first love but when you lose them so tragically...I’m not sure it's something you ever fully recover from. 

And then Stiles got sick. 

And it was like my world, my son's world, his friends, and a man, whom I had grown to love myself over the years; their worlds shattered apart like a mirror breaking in front of us. 

This wasn't a trick like last time. This was...just science. Genetics. 

And the first time Stiles cracked a joke about it I wanted to slap him. I almost did, but Scott grabbed my wrist before I could. He knew. He squeezed and said so much in that touch. Reminded me we all handle things differently. This is Stiles’ way. Let him have it. 

I watched as Stiles’ friends sat at his side day after day. I watched his father hold his hand and fall asleep next to his bed, instead of going home to sleep. I watched the people who loved him the most, hold his bedpan in front of him so he could vomit into it and help him into the shower when he was too weak to do it himself. I watched Lydia read to him until he fell asleep. I watched Scott shave his head because his best friend had to. 

I watched love engulf a barely turned 18-year-old boy over and over until sometimes it was almost too much for me to take. 

And the day I saw Derek Hale walk into that hospital I knew the walls of that establishment were not going to be able to contain the amount of love that boy was about to be wrapped in. 

Because I saw it in his eyes. I saw the defeat. The sadness. The raw emotion only someone who really loved and cared for another person in his eyes and it reminded me of the look John had all that time Claudia was sick. 

It brought back memories I wasn't ready to remember but they flooded back to me and I just whispered Stiles’ room number to him and steadied myself against the nurses station. 

I wanted to warn John when he walked past me an hour later on his lunch break to see Stiles. I wanted to tell him Derek Hale was back. Back for his son. Back because of Stiles.

But sometimes it's best to leave sleeping wolves lie.

**Sheriff:**

I know a lot more than I let on. 

I’m a quiet man, I always have been. Which is why when I married Claudia, no one quite understood. She was the opposite of me with a big mouth, big voice, big personality and she consumed everything in her path with her light and her life. 

The same way Stiles does. 

They both have this way to make people pay attention and then they end up loving them. I knew there were a lot of guys in our college that wanted Claudia. But she only had eyes for me. I was quiet, reserved, kept my emotions at bay; probably why I went into law enforcement. But somehow Claudia and I just fit together. 

So when I walked into Stiles’ hospital room to find Derek Hale sitting next to his bed, holding my son’s hand against his forehead as he was hunched over in his chair and Stiles’ free hand was petting the top of his head, I honestly wasn’t as surprised as you might think I should have been. 

Derek Hale was crying and Stiles’s eyes were closed and he had this look of satisfaction and gratitude on his face. It wasn’t malicious. He wasn’t happy that Derek was sad. It wasn’t that kind of satisfaction. It's just...it's the same way Claudia used to comfort me when she was sick and I would lose it and cry and scream at the world and God and whoever else was listening about how unfair it all was. 

Stiles’ always reminded me of his mother, but I never realized how much Derek Hale reminded me of myself. 

And of course, he would be drawn to someone like Stiles. Just like I had been drawn to Claudia. Some couples just don't make sense. But they don't need to. As long as they make sense to each other. 

It's the last thing I should have been thinking or worrying about considering how serious Stiles’ condition was. But I wasted so much time when Claudia was sick on hating the world and the disease and the doctors and the medications and time and fate and anything else I could think of, that I missed out on a lot of time I could have just had with her. 

And I didn't know if I was going to lose my son too. I didn't know if the world was that cruel, even though I had seen some pretty cruel things in my line of work. So I was trying to just focus on Stiles and if he was happy. If he was safe and somewhat content until he had his surgery and then we could start all over again from there. 

I felt like I did that a lot. Start over. You think I would have been used to that by now. 

Stiles’ eyes opened and he gave me a smirk. 

“Heya, Daddy-o.”

Derek’s head whipped up and he let go of Stiles’ hand as if it was on fire, which I’m sure to him it was, and the uncomfortable, trust me I know, chair screeched across the floor beside Stiles’ bed. He wiped his eyes and sniffled loudly. 

“Hello, Sir...Sheriff.”

“Derek.” I sat the bag of curly fries down on the tray beside Stiles’ bed. “Didn't know you were back in town.” Come on, I had to give him a little shit. It's my duty as a father. 

“I...came...Scott called.” Derek cleared his throat and looked all around the room but at me. Same way I used to do with Claudia’s father. 

“It's fine, Derek. Glad you’re here. Did you eat? I have burgers.” I started to remove the food from the grease ridden bags but Derek just shook his head.

“I should really get going. I...I mean I’ll be back…” He gave Stiles a look and Stiles gave him the thumbs up sign. 

“Of course, you will, Der-bear.” Stiles winked at him and I watched as Derek’s neck turns a bright red color. 

“Right. I...goodbye, Sir. Sheriff.” Derek’s hands wrapped around the door jamb but before he can escape I say his name firmly. 

He turned to me, eyes still glassy with emotion. 

“Call me John, son.”

He nodded once and was gone before I could let out the breath I had been holding. I turned to my son who was smiling. 

“Curly fries?”

“You’re in deep shit trouble,” I warned him, handing him a bag. 

“In what way? That these fries are going to make me hurl all over the place, or that I have a tumor the size of a golf ball lodged in my cranial tissue?” I watched my son shovel fried jumbled potatoes into his mouth and sighed heavily. 

“All of the above and also none of those.” I pulled the chair to the side of his bed and gave him the look. The look where he knew exactly what I was talking about but he insisted on pretending he didn't. It's a look he knew well. 

“Yeah, well,” Stiles swallowed and leaned his head back against his pillow, eyes sliding shut with exhaustion just from the tiny amount of effort it took for him to eat the fries. “I bet if it was any one of us that was lying in this bed he would be here.”

“You’re probably right.”

He fell asleep only seconds after that statement and I finished my lunch watching him sleep. After I cleaned up, I kissed his forehead and closed the door gently to his room. 

It didn't surprise me to find Derek sitting right outside his door, knees pulled up to his chest, head buried between his knees. 

Stiles wasn't just anyone. 

He never was.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _I feel like for the past few weeks everyone is just lying to themselves. Lying to each other. Stiles will be fine. There is no way Stiles will die. It's not that big of a deal. He’s in good hands. Everyone pretends to smile. Everyone acts as though Stiles isn't lying in the bed dying. They don't want to face the truth. No one tells the goddamn truth anymore._
> 
> _“How did you do it?” I finally whisper. “How did you...keep going?”_
> 
> _I watch as Derek’s Adam's apple bobs at my words and the reality and the memories that he swallows down. He turns to me, expression calm. No eyebrows raised. No arms crossed across his chest._
> 
> _Just Derek._
> 
> _“I didn’t.”_
> 
> Told from multiple POV's of the pack as they all come to realize in their own ways what matters most in this world, what true love really means, and how much the power of that love can overcome when something non-supernatural threatens to take one of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all the positive feed back I have received on this fic. It is a subject matter than can be triggering but I just needed to get my own feelings about what the characters were like in the face of something non supernatural. I wanted to write my own head canon for almost every single character on the show, and this fic is allowing me to do so. I hope you enjoy this chapter. More coming soon. As always, comments are love <3

**Scott:**

Sometimes I wish I could be the one who falls apart. 

Sometimes I wish I could just...not be the hero. I know it sounds shitty and whiny and I kinda feel like a jackass even saying it, but 9 times outta 10 I’m scared out of my mind but I still need to be strong and brave for everyone else around me. 

And I hate it. 

Even when there isn't danger looming over our town, I still need to be on high alert. The second I get too comfortable or actually let something make me happy, I lose any control I have. Look what happened with Allison. And Kira. 

And the second I feel like I can breathe again; Lydia’s safe and sound out of Eichen, the beat is eliminated...I get the call from my mom. 

Stiles. 

Like he hasn't been through enough? Like the Sheriff hasn't been through enough?

Like we all haven't been through enough?

If I believed in God...which honestly I don’t know what I believe if anything...I’d be screaming at him every night just asking why. Why did he take Stiles’ mother so soon? Why did he take Allison? Why did he take the pile of people in this town that didn’t deserve it? Why did he let something so awful happen to Derek’s family?

And why is he doing this to Stiles?

I don't want to keep chalking it up to ‘that’s life’ and ‘sometimes bad things happen to good people’. I’m done being the optimist. I’m done being the guy always in control. The leader. The Alpha. Let someone else do it while my best friends lies in that hospital bed unable to keep food in his stomach. 

I’m done being this town’s whipping boy. I’m done with evil and death and anything else ‘life’ wants to throw my way. 

Which is why I am so glad Derek’s back. 

He knew the second he saw my face what I needed. 

A break.

And he took the reins back. He may not be an Alpha anymore, but he was always the Alpha of this land, his land. And he knows what I need to do now, what’s needed of me the most, is to just be there for my friend and his family without the worry of anything else. Of the next big bad to barge into our little town and demand to be heard. Derek said it with his eyes and the firm handshake he gave me when he showed up at my door, that yes, he will take charge right now. If something comes, he will handle it. 

It's good of him. He’s a good man. He’s become such a good man. 

But it's not why he’s here. He’s not here because I need help even though he’d be more than willing to lay his life on the line for this town and the pack he left behind. 

No, he’s here for Stiles. Because even though Stiles refuses, as does his father, to let me do something if he gets too bad. If the surgery doesn't work, Derek knows I will. He knows I’ll go against their wishes and latch my teeth into Stiles’ skin to save his life. 

And Derek is going to be the one holding him down while I do. 

I can see the pained expression in his eyes as we talk about what might need to be done if the surgery doesn't work on my ratty old living room couch. He doesn't want it to come to that. He’s forced too many teenagers already to live a life they weren't meant or ready to. He’s already lost too much. Too many people. 

And it's possible, we both know it, that it might not even work if we try and turn Stiles. 

And then he’d end up losing someone else he cares about. 

I know all about Paige. 

Stiles told me. 

There are risks. But we both decided, as the leaders of this town...this pack...that no matter what we do what we need to do to save Stiles. 

It's selfish. It's reckless. It goes against everything I am as an Alpha...and a friend. 

But I barely made it after Allison. And now Kira is gone. 

I won't make it without Stiles. 

And when I mutter those same words to Derek and his eyes lift up to reach mine he doesn't need to say it for me to know. 

He won't make it either. 

Derek wasn't even here for the worst of it. To watch each day as Stiles got sicker and sicker. As the light in his eyes and the humor that always prevailed no matter what slowly diminished. How the highlight of the day was him not throwing up the chicken broth they gave him for lunch. He told me every time I walked into his room how weird I looked now that my head was shaved. He was right. I did look weird. But if my best friend can't have hair, neither will I. It’s the only support I know how to give. It's all I can do until there's nothing left for me to do. 

I wanted to hug Stiles before they kicked me out of his room the morning of his surgery. I wanted to tell him, again, no matter how much he protested, that I was going to do something if this didn't work. The world needs Stiles Stilinski. I need Stiles Stilinski. 

But I didn't hug him. He just gave me a thumbs up sign, in typical Stiles fashion and I just smiled. What else could I do? I wanted to cry. I always want to cry these days. For Allison. Because of Kira. For the look on everyone's faces as they try to be strong. For my Mom. For the Sheriff. 

I find Derek outside, leaning against the brick wall of the hospital, an unlit cigarette between his fingers.

“Does that even do anything? You know, for us?” I ask. 

He shrugs. “Wouldn’t know. Never smoked. But seems like a good as time as any to start.” He pauses for a moment, rolling the cigarette between his thumb and index finger before flicking it out toward the parking lot. “I really hate this hospital.”

The statement holds so much in it. So many memories. So much meaning. The words are so thick in the air I decide it's best not to comment. 

It's silent for a while, the cool morning breeze blowing and the only sound coming from the cars passing through the lot and our breathing. Ragged and out of sync with one another. 

I feel like for the past few weeks everyone is just lying to themselves. Lying to each other. Stiles will be fine. There is no way Stiles will die. It's not that big of a deal. He’s in good hands. Everyone pretends to smile. Everyone acts as though Stiles isn't lying in the bed dying. They don't want to face the truth. No one tells the goddamn truth anymore. 

“How did you do it?” I finally whisper. “How did you...keep going?”

I watch as Derek’s Adam's apple bobs at my words and reality and memories that he swallows down. He turns to me, expression calm. No eyebrows raised. No arms crossed across his chest.

Just Derek. 

“I didn’t.”

“You did a pretty good job pretending.”

Derek brings his lips into his mouth. “Not everyone buys the act.”

I feel the familiar ache in my chest. 

“Like Stiles?”

Derek nods, his eyes meeting mine. Just Derek. 

“Its why I cant lose him. He’s the only one who sees me.”

**Malia:**

Everyone always looks at me weird. 

I always say something wrong or inappropriate and at the wrong time or in the wrong tone or whatever. It's annoying. I’m annoying apparently. 

But the only one who never looked at me weird from the very beginning was Stiles. 

Maybe it's because he’s weird too and a lot of people don't understand him either. But he was the most patient with me. He didn't yell or tell me I was doing something wrong or try to correct me when I didn't say something that somebody else wouldn't dream of saying. He was assuring and comforting and loyal. 

Those things I understand. Coyote or human. 

Which is why, even after we ended whatever type of sexual relationship he and I were having, I stuck by him. I told him once I’d never leave him behind. I meant it. No matter what. 

Usually, if another animal was wounded or sick I would leave it behind so it didn't slow me down. But Stiles isn't just some other animal I have come across in my path. Coyotes aren't known as being as loyal as wolves, but my human side outweighs my coyote on this one and I won't leave Stiles behind. Sick or not. 

Everyone was so nervous for me to go see him when he got put in the hospital. They all talked to me in these low condescending voices about not telling him how horrible he looked and to smile and be optimistic or whatever. 

So I tried. I smiled and nodded when everyone praised how great Stiles looked and was doing. Stiles just looked at me weird the whole time. 

When visiting hours were over and we all piled out, Stiles called me back and I stood next to his bed and he reached out for my hand like he had done so many times before. 

“Stop acting how they tell you that you should act, and act like Malia.”

I never went back with all of them again. 

If I wanted to see Stiles I went on my own. 

I think he liked the fact that I was honest. That I told him he didn't look good, because on the days he actually did look okay, he knew it was the truth. I warned him when he asked me to bring him a burger how it would make him feel, but I let him eat it anyway and just shook my head as he puked it all up 20 minutes later. He always said the same thing. 

“So worth it.”

Which is why I knew I was the only one he would tell the truth to when the big question arose. 

“Derek’s back.”

“I know. I saw him.” He smirks. “I can’t believe he’s your cousin.”

“Shut up.”

He laughs. “Point proven.”

“What did he say to you?”

Stiles shrugs. “He didn't do much talking. He did cry, though. Never thought I’d see that again.”

“He cried? Because of you?” 

“I know. Who knew he cared so much? Guess I look shittier than I thought.” He clicks through the channels on his TV. “But it was nice to see him.”

“He’s helping Scott. Like...keep the town in check or whatever.”

Stiles nods. “Good.” He looks at me and frowns. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“I thought we weren't going to lie to each other?”

“What am I lying about?”

“Derek.”

“I didn't lie. He came here. He cried.”

“And?”

Stiles sighs heavily. “And I felt more alive when he was in this room with me than I have since I got sick.”

“Good. Now you can have the cheeseburger I brought you.” I pull the bag from my purse and he narrows his eyes at me. 

“Cheater.”

**Derek:**

_“And I felt more alive when he was in this room with me than I have since I got sick.”_

I don't know how my life could get any more cliche than it has. The tragic tale of a man who escapes his hometown in order to find some peace in his life just to return to it because the person he’s in love with gets sick and he could die but he won't tell him he loves him because it isn't fair and blah blah blah. 

How pathetic am I?

And I want to admit that those words I heard Stiles say don't mean anything to me. But I’d be lying. And I’m done lying. 

And everyone looks at me the same. Scott, Lydia, Melissa, even the Sheriff. They are always trying to figure me out. Trying to dissect a look or a sigh. Or analyze my words until they don't even exist in the English language anymore. 

But Stiles doesn't do that. And it's not because he's sick. He never did. 

He never let me get away with any bullshit, then or now. The second time I went to go see him, again without telling anyone, he told me I wasn't allowed to cry again. That I get one meltdown. Only one. I agreed. 

So for the 3 hours I was there with him we watched Maury Povich and I ate his green jello. 

We didn't talk much; he told me he was kinda tired of always talking. I didn't ask him how he was feeling or if there was anything I could do. Because I could see perfectly well how he was feeling. And I knew there was nothing really I could do but sit there with him. 

But when we did talk, it was more meaningful than most conversations in my life. 

“You think there is a different afterlife for werewolves as opposed to humans?”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “What?”

He just laughed and shook his head. “I love seeing your reactions to things.”

It's quiet for a while after that and I almost break my promise of no crying again when he fills the room with his voice.

“I just wanna make sure I’m with everyone I care about in case I..you know. Like I know I’ll see my mom and when my Dad finally goes and my Pop-Pop. But like what about Scott? Or Lydia, whatever the hell she is? And...you?”

I looked away from him, my eyes closed and I tried to regulate my breathing. When I thought I could finally speak again without my voice cracking I told him the most truthful thing I could think of.

“You’re not going to die. At least not now. And I promise you, I will find you. No matter what I will always find you.” 

He just gave me this sleepy smile. “Okay, Sour Wolf.”

**Deaton:**

I don't show my emotions often. Even when I deeply care for someone, I try always to be the voice of reason, the calm in the storm. I always keep my faith in humanity and the people around me and know then when it is my time to go or the time of someone close to me, I know it's just life and there is a universal plan out there and I need to accept fate. 

But when I found out about Stiles, I was anything but calm. I always knew, since the moment I met Mr. Stilinski that he was born to be my predecessor. He had emissary; the spark; in his bones and he would be one of the greatest I had ever lived to see. Even though this town has changed Alpha’s hands many times over, in a way Stiles was always all of their emissaries. Even Peter’s. The Hales, all of them, had a particular itch for Stiles, even dating back to when I was Talia Hale’s emissary. I recall her eyeing him outside an ice cream store one time. Vanilla ice cream dripping down his arm as he flailed and hummed as he tried to lick it off his skin. She pulled a napkin from her purse and helped him clean up as his father emerged, carrying his own cone from the store. They smiled at each other, the Sheriff thanking Talia for helping. We had heard around town of Claudia Stilinski’s death but we didn't really know the family all that well. 

“Sweet boy.” She murmured after we went along our way. 

“Mmmm.”

“You feel it, don't you?”

“Of course.”

“Keep an eye on him. He’s powerful.”

“Of course.” I echoed again. 

So when I found out Stiles was sick it wasn't just because he was a sweet, decent, smart boy, but because he was destined to save us. All of us. 

And any and all calm I used to have in situations like this went right out the window. 

Not a lot of things surprised me anymore. So when I found Derek Hale sitting in my office 3 weeks after Stiles’ diagnosis, I wasn't surprised. Just surprised he hadn't gotten here sooner. 

He asked what I knew everyone else wanted to but didn't have the courage to. 

“There has to be something. If the Goddamn cancer doesn't kill him the radiation will!”

“I’m an emissary, Derek. Not a witch.”

“I’m sure you know some.” 

“Maybe. But that doesn't mean I’m going to do what you ask.”

His hands slam down on the metal exam table and he snarls millimeters from my face. 

“You have to let fate takes its course. If Stiles’ time on this earth is through we all need to accept that. When you mess with magic and circle of life and death you run the risk of things you are not prepared to handle. Do you understand what I am saying, Derek? If you think what happened with the nemeton was bad? The nogitsune? The Oni? You have no idea what kind of chaos black magic will do. Because that’s really what you're asking. You’re asking me to perform a black magic spell. Are you prepared for the consequences?”

“Are you prepared for the consequences if I...if we lose Stiles? What this world will be like? What will happen to this town?” His canine teeth glisten in the soft lighting of the exam room in front of me. 

“I’m fully aware. But there are some things that are just not meant to be tampered with. I have to draw the line somewhere. Even for Stiles.”

There is barely anything left upright before he exits through the front door and I hear a loud sigh behind me. But I don't turn around. 

“You’d better hope Stiles pulls through, Scott. If not that man is going to burn this town to the ground.”

**Isaac:**

If I’ve said it once, I’ll say it a million times. 

I’m not good with the whole helping thing. I spent most of my childhood locked in a freezer, excuses,excuses I know, but it's the truth. I never had real friends, I never had a good father figure. I didn't really understand or embrace what a real family was. When we lost my brother, my dad was never really the same. He was the son he always wanted. He was his pride and joy. And every time he looked at me once my brother died, it was just a reminder of what he had lost. 

I never knew what it was like to have a father like the Sheriff. I never got the looks from my father that the Sheriff gives Stiles. And I never had friends like the ones I have now. I never had anyone in my life, other than my brother, that I would die for. But now I do. I’d die for Scott or Stiles or anyone of the people that have come into my life. 

I had to leave when Allison…

Chris and I both had to. He came back a lot earlier than I did. I remember him calling me and telling me something bad was happening, again, in Beacon Hills and did I want to come back to help fight. I declined. 

I wasn't ready. I wasn't sure I’d ever be ready. 

I don't know how Scott stayed. I get he kinda had to. Family, being the Alpha and all. And honestly, I wasn't sure I would ever fully be able to look Stiles in the face again after what happened to Allison. I know it wasn't his fault. Technically. But it's why I didn't say goodbye. I didn't know what to say. Or how to look at him.

But I never once wished anything bad to happen to him.

Maybe it's guilt that brought me back when Chris called me, yet again, and I thought it was to ask, yet again, to come help him fight. But all he did was tell me to call Scott. That it was important. And it was time to go back. 

I didn't even hesitate when Scott told me. All that time away and nothing would have kept me from being by Stiles’ side through this. Yeah, we had our differences, even before Allison. But no one deserved this. 

No one was surprised to see me. No one asked me where I had been. Not even Scott. He just hugged me and I felt the tension and sadness and relief to finally have me back in that hug. I’m never much help, to anyone, but maybe I could help with this. 

Seeing Derek again threw me. For some reason, it was less confusing for everyone to see me back than Derek. Which made no sense to me because there was nowhere else Derek would be than right by Stiles’ side. It's where he always was. 

I may not be of much help, and I may not talk much but I pay attention. I am the eyes and ears of this pack. 

And Derek knows it. 

It threw me to see him again because well, come on, it had been a long time and we didn't exactly leave everything on the best of terms. Chris tried to keep me updated with what he had heard about him, but once Kate took off and the dread doctors came into town, not much had been heard of when it came to Derek. So I stopped asking. 

It may have thrown me to see Derek, but he acted as though nothing had happened. That whatever past we had, was just that. The past. He seemed content. At peace. But sad. There would always be the underlying sadness beneath his skin. Now he just radiates it more because of Stiles. 

None of us want to lose Stiles. All for different reasons. 

“Brought you a scarf.” 

I hold it out in front of me, not wrapped, it hanging through my fingers. Its red. He seems to like red. “Cause you know. It gets cold in here.”

Stiles just laughs. Like, hold his stomach, tears streaming down his face, laughter. He takes it from me and wipes his eyes with it. 

“Never realized how much I missed you until now. Come on, sit. Watch Oprah with me. Lydia usually does but she’s having dinner with her mom tonight. So it's just me and you fashion wolf.”

I make no remark at his pet name for me and pull the chair next to his bed. I fall asleep about 30 minutes into Oprah and my ears perk up but I don't open my eyes when I hear the familiar voice in the room. 

“Look how much you’re little wolf has grown up, Sourwolf. He brought me a present.”

“That thing is hideous.”

“Hey! It's the thought that counts. I wonder if he got it in France.”

“It has a JC Penney tag on it.”

“Maybe there are JC Penny’s in France.”

“I highly doubt that.”

“Such a pessimist.”

“Put it on its cold.”

“How would you know? You’re like an oven.”

“You didn't seem to complain the other night when you begged me to cuddle you.”

“I cannot believe you just said the word cuddle. And I did not beg. You offered because my teeth were chattering.”

“Put it on. It’ll make him feel good.”

“Yes, Alpha.”

I pretend to sleep almost the entire time Derek is there. I finally open my eyes when the talking stops and I leave quietly with Derek wrapped around Stiles in his small hospital bed, the scarf I gave him also wrapped around his neck.


	3. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _“We don't need to get into semantics about it. We don't even ever need to discuss this again. I promise. I won't meddle. I won't ask a million dad questions I know I am supposed to ask. I’m not going to go into the police officer spiel about age and consent and whatever else law crap I could get into. Just know...I approve. Of you. So...if Stiles is what you want...I…” I clear my throat and regret even doing this now that the words are coming from my mouth because who the hell am I to tell Derek Hale anything? I could be reading this all wrong and Derek might have a girlfriend back where he came from and maybe this is all just friendship and Derek being a good Alpha or once Alpha or whatever the hell and I’m just...shit. “Nevermind. I don't know what I’m saying.” I pat his leg and go to stand but I feel his fingers touch my wrist. I look down at him._
> 
> _“I...I do.” He whispers. “I do want him.”_
> 
> Told from multiple POV's of the pack as they all come to realize in their own ways what matters most in this world, what true love really means, and how much the power of that love can overcome when something non-supernatural threatens to take one of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I cannot believe the outpour of love for this fic. Thank you all for reading and commenting. It means the world to me. 
> 
> This is going to be the last multiple POV chapter. After this its only going to be one possibly two POV's per chapter and is going to start focusing more on STILES than anyone else. 
> 
> As always comments are pure love and make me feel all warm and squishy.

**Sheriff:**

My son has some terrific friends. 

I was quiet growing up, reserved. I had a few kids I hung around with and then that one best friend all through high school, but I never knew anyone like the kids my son is friends with. Maybe when you face imminent danger at every turn, it brings people closer together. 

It's what happened with me and Melissa. I mean, of course, she was always there. So supportive, attentive not only to my son but to me when Claudia died. She insisted on being her nurse and soon the doctors and other faculty at the hospital just stopped asking questions and stopped spewing crap about protocol and how Melissa was an ER nurse, not a cancer ward nurse and eventually for the rest of the time Claudia was in the hospital, Melissa never left her side. 

Or Stiles’. 

When I had to work because truth was I was still going to need to put food on the table after Claudia was finally gone, Melissa would watch him. Scott would come to the hospital after school with Stiles and she would keep an eye on them as they ran up and down the halls, climbing all over wheelchairs and eating candy out of the vending machines. Life was still pretty simple for Stiles then even though his mother was sick. Stiles was then and still is an eternal optimist. 

So when Claudia finally died, it was like he was surprised. He was in shock that things didn't work out for the best like he always believed, ever since he was able to form a coherent thought, would. He would scream at me, Scott, Melissa, his teachers, even his stuffed animals how death was stupid and this wasnt supposed to happen and where was mom and it's not a good enough excuse, I know that now, but it's why the bottle was easier to pick up than the pieces of my sons broken heart. Because how was I supposed to mend his when mine was broken too?

If it hadnt been for Melissa, I never would have made it. She knew the drinking had gotten too bad because Stiles was spending way more time at the Mccall residence than was healthy. She picked me up, dusted me off and got me back on my feet. 

So maybe it took a few years, but because of Stiles, I ended up with a friend that would put their life on the line for me. Who would never leave my side in a time of need. 

Like now. 

Melissa refused to work the day of Stiles’ surgery. She sat next to me, just like everyone else in Stiles’ life, in the waiting room, holding my hand. None of the kids went to school that day. They were all huddled around on the couches and chairs, some sipping their non fat no whip whatever lattes, some falling asleep because truth it no one has really been sleeping much lately. Some wide awake, staring straight ahead, just waiting. 

Seems like Derek has always been waiting for something. 

Some kind of peace. Some kind of affirmation that things may work out one day. That something good might actually come out of this town. I will never understand why that man keeps coming back time and time again. Back to the pain. The memories. 

Back for Stiles. 

I give Melissa’s hand a tight squeeze before I lift myself up from my chair and find a new one next to Derek.

“You good, Son?”

He nods, still staring straight ahead, looking at nothing. Or at least I see nothing. Maybe he sees stuff none of us can see. I’m sure he can. 

“You know,” I lower my voice a little but I know there are a ton of werewolf ears in here that are going to hear me no matter how much I lower my voice. “If he makes it through this...you have my blessing.”

His head whips toward me, eyes wide but narrowed on mine. Huh, never realized how green his eyes were until now. Like his mother's. 

“Excuse me?”

“We don't need to get into semantics about it. We don't even ever need to discuss this again. I promise. I won't meddle. I wont ask a million dad questions I know I am supposed to ask. I’m not going to go into the police officer spiel about age and consent and whatever else law crap I could get into. Just know...I approve. Of you. So...if Stiles is what you want...I…” I clear my throat and regret even doing this now that the words are coming from my mouth because who the hell am I to tell Derek Hale anything? I could be reading this all wrong and Derek might have a girlfriend back where he came from and maybe this is all just friendship and Derek being a good Alpha or once Alpha or whatever the hell and I’m just...shit. “Nevermind. I don't know what I’m saying.” I pat his leg and go to stand but I feel his fingers touch my wrist. I look down at him. 

“I...I do.” He whispers. “I do want him.”

“Good. Then he has something to fight for.” I give Derek a small smile and make my way back over to Melissa. She retakes my hand instantly and gives me a warm smile. 

“How did you know?” She asks me. I shrug as I watch Derek go back to his stone like position, just staring at something none of us can see. 

“How did you?” I ask back at her. Melissa looks across the room to Derek and sighs softly. 

“Who wouldn't fall in love with Stiles?”

**Lydia:**

I don't even know why I bother doing my nails these days. All I do is pick the polish off them, Literally every flake till there is nothing left. I guess it's better than cutting myself or pulling my hair out. 

Everyone in the waiting room is trying to busy themselves. Playing a game on their phone, doing homework (poor Scott, he’s still trying to get his grades caught up from sophomore year), or just staring straight ahead into oblivion. There's too much to think about. Too much to consider. Too much ‘what if’s’ because what if Stiles doesn't make it? What if the surgery doesn't work? What if we lose someone else? 

I promised myself that if Stiles pulls through this I was going to tell him how I felt. I was going to tell him I wouldn't be alive, 10 times over if it weren't for him. I was going to tell him I loved him; and not in some passing goodnight way I had been telling him every night when I left the hospital. He was going to know, finally, the real love I felt inside my heart for him. He was going to get better and I would finally realize what it felt like to really be loved too. 

I know Jackson loved me. He loved me the best way he knew how because Jackson doesn't know how to love. He was never taught. You learn from experience. You learn what real love is by watching the people around you. But Jackson wasn't raised that way. I don't know much about his adoption. His upbringing. He kept most of it from me. It was his weakness. And the last thing Jackson wanted to seem was weak. 

But I know, in the end, he loved me. It was my love that pulled him back. But in the end, my love wasn't strong enough to keep him here. Sometimes it's best just to let some things go. 

But I refused to let that happen with Stiles. 

I had made my decision. 

But sometimes the best thing you can do for someone, especially someone you love, is to let them go. And I realize now that's what Jackson did for me. 

And it's what I need to do for Stiles. 

It’s not like I’m totally alone. I’ve kind of forgotten that spark I feel with Jordan because of all this that's going on with Stiles. And maybe when you’re faced with the idea that you could lose someone so important to you, feelings get brought up that you didn't know were there. And I need to be fair to Jordan. He’s been there...we’ve been through a lot. He’s been patient and kind to me and sometimes I tend to forget he helped save my life too. We’ve helped each other figure things about ourselves and my bond with him is special. 

And to just forget all that, to dismiss it because I’m feeling guilty about Stiles and possibly misunderstanding my level of love for Stiles because I just don't want to lose him, bottom line, is not something I am ready to do. 

I owe it to myself and to Jordan to see what it could be between us. 

I hear the conversation between Stiles’ dad and Derek. I don't even think Mr. Stilinski realizes that I’m sitting directly behind Derek in the long row of chairs in the waiting room. For some reason, not many people notice me these days. But I heard every word. 

What the sheriff doesn't know is what Derek tells me later. 

I go outside not long after, another hour added onto another hour of waiting for the doctors to come out and tell us something, anything, about Stiles’ surgery, and Derek isn't far behind me. His eyes lock with mine, nothing different than the day at the cemetery but this time he decides he wants to hold a conversation with me. 

“It doesn't matter, you know.” He tells me. I don't look at him. I squint up into the sunlight beaming down from the sky. Seems odd to be such a bright sunny day. Maybe it's a good thing. Maybe it's just a sick joke like everything else seems to be. 

“What doesn’t matter?” I ask. 

“How I feel. Why I’m here. I’m not going to do anything. He belongs with you.” Derek explains. 

“I think that's Stiles’ decision to make.”

“You’re right. And he will choose you. Because...it doesn’t matter how I feel.” 

I finally turn to look at him; his hands pulled into the long sleeves of his henley and I wonder if it's something he used to do when he was younger. When the world seemed so big and he was just still small and it comforted him. 

Stiles does the same thing. 

“It already does, Derek.”

Derek’s eyes go wide and I watch him swallow down the big words I just laid on him. 

“I waited too long. Whatever Stiles and I could have had is long gone. I know that now. He and I are too...too much has happened. And I’m okay with that. If this….if the surgery works, he should be with someone who has fought for him. Who never gave up on him. Someone who has wanted him from the beginning. I don't deserve him. But you do.”

“No,” Derek takes a step toward me shaking his head. 

“Don’t give up on him, Derek. Don't give up because of some fucked up notion in your head that you aren't worth it. Or that you don't deserve him too. You do. You heard the sheriff in there. He wants you with his son. Werewolf and all. So let's go back inside and wait to hear what's going to happen. And when we know you can decide from there what you’re going to do. I just hope it's the right thing.” I motion toward the revolving door leading back into a place full of unanswered questions. 

Derek just nods and goes back inside. 

I lean against the wall and look back up to the sky; the sun shining brighter than before. 

“Hey, Allison,” I whisper.

**Derek:**

Sometimes you don’t realize how you feel until someone tells you. 

For someone like me, who has stuffed down and ignored all human emotion for so long you have to convince yourself that what you _think_ you may be feeling you aren't. That you’re just loyal and you want to protect and support and help because it's what you were taught by your parents. You stay loyal to your pack. 

Even if they don't consider you pack. 

And I was scared how fast I ran back to Beacon Hills when Scott called me. Like I was always looking for an excuse, any reason really, to have to go back. I just never wanted it to be a reason like this. 

And the kind of relationship Stiles and I always had; that back and forth love to hate each other but we can't help but save each other when faced with danger; had never made sense to anyone, especially us. But when everyone keeps telling you that you’re in love with Stiles, it starts to make you have to re-evaluate yourself on a whole different level. 

I don't even know what love is. The only kind of ‘love’ I had ever thought I had, came in the form of an older woman who called me handsome and sweetie and touched me sooner than I had wanted her to, took away not only my innocence and self-respect but my family too. 

Old habits die hard years later when I fall into bed with someone else mistaking it for love again when I just craved the touch of someone and I think because I ‘saved’ her once, she could save me from myself. 

And what if that's what this is too, with Stiles? Just a bunch of pain and destruction I am mistaking yet again as love? But it was Stiles who spewed in my face about Jennifer and kept his mouth shut about Kate even though I know he knew everything. Stiles never touched me when I didn't want him to. He never did anything before I was ready and he could read me better than any beta I could have turned myself. 

His heartbeat synced with mine and his scent used to get rubbed off on my clothes and it traveled with me no matter where I went or who I was with. 

So the things, the feelings, I had tried so hard to ignore to lie to myself about could no longer be hidden or disguised or avoided once my feet landed back on Beacon Hills soil and everyone kept giving me the same looks whenever they saw me. 

And now the Sheriff with his words, and Lydia’s self-sacrifice bullshit. Doesn’t she know this town isn’t big enough for the two of us when it comes to that department? 

And I guess I’m just full of shit. 

And now I’m sitting in this fucking hospital waiting to hear if the only person I’ve ever really loved is going to live or die. And even then it won't be that simple. Because if he does live he has a long road ahead of him. Will he even want me there? Because I know wild horses couldn't drag me away. Jesus. When did my life become a goddamn love song?

“You hungry?” Scott leans in to ask me. I just shake my head.

“I don't think I’ve ever seen you eat.” 

I side eye him. “I eat.”

“What do you eat?”

I almost smirk. “Green Jello.”

Scott smiles at me and I know he understands. “He’s gonna be okay. It's Stiles, you know?”

I finally look at him, and I realize just how much he’s grown up over the few years I’ve known him. How he’s grown into himself not only as a man but as a wolf too. An Alpha. And even though I’m not the one who bit him, and no matter how many times he will tell me I’m a part of the ‘pack’ I will always feel a sense of pride when I look at him. Same way I feel pride when I look at Isaac. 

“I know. Stiles isn't one to just give up on the first sign of distress.” 

Scott laughs and goes back to angry birds on his phone. My eyes catch Isaacs across the room and he nods toward the coffee machine and I get up meeting him there in an awkward encounter neither of us are sure how to get through, I’m sure. I put 2, 1 dollar bills in the machine and push for a black coffee and then look at him for him to push what he wants. He looks shocked, which it's just a dollar and I’m not sure why, but then I have to remember Isaac isn't used to people doing nice things for him. I had hoped with his time away he had found some self-confidence but if anyone knows it's me that old habits die hard. 

We sip our hot coffee by the machine in silence as we watch the rest of the crowd; friends and family; that have gathered for Stiles. Even Scott’s new beta, Liam is there with his girlfriend Hayden. And his best friend Mason. I don't know much about the newest members of Scott’s pack, but they are loyal. And that's all I could ask for for him. 

“Stiles sure is loved.” Isaac whispers and my wolf almost whines at the sadness in his voice. 

“So are you, Isaac,” I tell him. He snorts and shakes his head. 

“Nah, not like this.” 

“We would all be right here, in these same chairs, if it was you. I wouldn't lie to you. I don't need to. Not anymore.” I put my hand on his shoulder. “You should come home. For good. It's time.”

“Are you?” He clears his throat and looks down into the swirling cream in his coffee cup. “Coming back, I mean?”

“I think so.”

“Because of Stiles?”

“Yes. And for everyone else. If he…” I swallow hard and choke down the possible reality. “I want to be here for everyone just in case.”

“Yeah.” Isaac nods. “Me too.”

I smile at him and wrap my arm around his shoulder. He lets me, resting his head against my shoulder and I wonder when the last time someone hugged him. 

Probably around the same time, someone hugged me.

**Peter:**

Just because you can't see me, doesn't mean I’m not there. 

That should be written on my tombstone. 

If I even get a tombstone, Which I’m going to go out on a limb and say I probably won't have one. 

No one really likes me in this town. Including my own nephew. I guess I deserve it. Okay, I do but I also like to think I’m misunderstood. I just want what’s rightfully mine. The Hale land. The Alpha title. But it all keeps slipping through my hands. I’m not malicious...unless I need to be. I’m manipulative when I need to be to get what I need done. Everything I have ever done was for the greater good of my family and this town. 

I should be in charge. I’m the smartest, the most equipped. It's what my sister would have wanted. The whole killing Laura thing was an accident. I was a bit more...feral..hostile then. But I’m much better now. I can see clearly of the big picture. 

Escaping Eichen house was easier than I thought it was going to be. After everything with the dread doctors, Ms. Martin, the beast (Yes I know everything. Like I said just because you don't see me doesn't mean I’m not there), slipping out the back door of that place was a piece of cake And since then I was regaining my strength and planning my next move. 

I knew Derek was gone and no one seemed to be too concerned for me, looking for me or even caring if I was alive or dead (rude) so going back to my old apartment wasn't a problem at all. 

Then I heard about Stiles. And I knew Derek would be back. 

If there is one thing that weakens Derek more than dark dreary places to lurk, its sarcastic skinny humans. 

Hey, I see the appeal in Stiles. I offered him the bite. He would have been an excellent addition to my pack at the time. I was actually aiming for Stiles that night, not Scott. Seriously not Scott. Look what a pain in the ass he turned out to be. 

And I had a plan. A good plan. But then the town literally got turned upside down when an 18-year-old boy got cancer. Which would have been the perfect opportunity to strike, but I need Derek on this one. I want him on my side. By my side. And I figured it would be easy. He’s not really a part of the pack here in Beacon Hills. Scott has made his own little ducklings that fall behind him. The banshee and the hellhound are all standing behind him. The one beta Derek had left was gone; why wouldn't Derek want to come back and help me take this town back. It's Hale land. Hale’s should be running it. 

But when I strolled into the hospital last week in the early hours of the witching hour (knowing when Melissa Mccall’s hours are so she wouldn't see me and rat me out to her son or anyone else for that matter) I had a plan. A plan to just make sure the Stilinski kid was as sick as the town had been murmuring about. But when I walked into his room, I felt...something. I felt something for the first time in a long time other than revenge, pain, anger...and anything else evil people think I have running through my ice cold veins. 

I felt...happy. Happy for my nephew. 

It's not like I have no heart at all. I do love Derek. He’s the only family I have left. And yes, I blamed him for a long time for the Kate thing. Part of his torture he inflicts on himself is because of me and the blame I unloaded on him after the fire. And then his cosmic mistake with Jennifer Blake, which I took care of once and for all (you’re all welcome). I never wanted him to be in pain. I just wanted him to find someone to settle down with, have a few pups and just let me take my throne at the Alpha like I belonged. 

So I had a plan. But when I saw my nephew wrapped around a bald, pale-skinned sick 18-year-old in a small twin hospital bed, sound asleep, I felt….like maybe...just maybe...the plan could wait. 

It’s no fun winning anyway when you don't have anything or anyone to fight against.

**Danny:**

When you live in a town like Beacon Hills there are things you just kinda have to..deal with. Ignore. Go with the flow about. 

Like werewolves. Like giant lizard things. Like the school library getting destroyed every other week. I will never understand how people (parents, kids, teachers) can walk around so oblivious to everything that goes on in this town. Maybe they do know but they choose to ignore it because it's safer that way. Easier than asking questions they know they will never get real answers to. 

They accept that all those people dying out in the woods is, in fact, mountain lion attacks. Like really? Come on. We all can't be that stupid.

So yeah, I knew about the crap in this town. I knew about Mccall, and I knew something along the same lines was happening to Jackson. I knew that older guy that hung around Mccall and Stiles was not Stiles’ cousin. I knew Ethan was a werewolf. I was kinda impressed with myself that I bagged one. And I cared about him, a lot. But when everyone started to die, like everyone, in town I had to take a break. I knew Ethan wouldn't be able to stay in town now with his brother gone. He needed to figure out where he belonged after all the chaos has died down. And with him gone, and Jackson in London (How cliche) I knew it was time for me to take a big step back. 

So I transferred high schools. 

That's it. 

Big mystery solved. I didn't even know it was a huge deal until I walked into Stiles’ hospital room and Stiles and Scott gave me this look like I had been raised from the dead or something. They treated me like some kind of celebrity and seemed more focused on where I had been, and what I knew than the fact that Stiles had cancer. And shit, did he look awful. 

I had heard about Stiles because I ran into the Sheriff at Burger King when he was getting some food (his weekly fill of just something else Stiles was going to throw up) and he told me about Stiles. It's not like I stopped caring about all them. I kept up with the town's big bad things that were occurring. Sometimes I even wanted to help. Like the old days where I would do favors and pretend I still had no idea what was going on. I missed it sometimes. So I had to go see Stiles. He was my friend. No matter how long it had been. 

So I indulged them when they flailed around like fish out of water when they saw me. Answered their questions. Had some laughs about all the things they tried to hide from me, how secretive they thought they were being, but failed miserably at. It was nice to give Stiles something to laugh and smile about. 

Stiles seemed to understand the need for me to step back. He understands being the human in a sea of supernaturals. And it sucks, it really fucking sucks, that this is happening to him. Once Scott left for the night, I stuck around watching some sitcoms with him. I told him about my new school and how they don't have Lacrosse but I’m doing pretty well with football. That I met someone I really care about and that I do still think of Ethan and Stiles tells me he hasn't heard anything about him since he left. He asks about Jackson and I tell him what I know. Its simple. Nice. Just two humans doing human things. 

Like dying of cancer. 

When I come back from getting myself a cup of coffee I don’t walk right back into his room when I see “Miguel” standing by his bed, arms crossed across his chest. 

“Come on, Derek. Please? If I fall, you’ll catch me. I just need some fresh air.”

“The doctor said no.”

“What does the doctor know?”

“Oh, I don't know. EVERYTHING. Stiles, it's 2 days before your surgery. You need to stay in bed, make sure you don't get any infections or anything like that. Don’t you realize how important this is? You need to live, do you understand? You can't fucking die on me! Not now!”

Derek (So that's his real name) is shaking and Stiles stares at him with wide eyes at first and then the slow, devious, Stilinski smile forms on his lips.

“You love me.”

“Shut up.”

“You do!” Stiles tries to sit up but Derek puts his hand out against his chest and pushes him back down onto the bed. 

“Lie down and be quiet.”

Stiles just smiles, brighter than anything I have ever seen and makes grabby hands toward Derek. “Come cuddle me you big sour wolf.” 

My eyes widen at the statement. I knew it. I fucking knew it.

“I thought your friend was here.” Derek narrows his eyes at him and his nostrils flair. 

“Let's give him a show.” Stiles wiggles his eyebrows and Derek just sighs heavily. 

I decide to leave after that, because hey, who am I to interrupt Stiles getting some heavy cuddle action from one of the hottest guys I’ve ever seen?


	4. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _It started with a headache._
> 
>  
> 
> Told from multiple POV's of the pack as they all come to realize in their own ways what matters most in this world, what true love really means, and how much the power of that love can overcome when something non-supernatural threatens to take one of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all again so much for following this fic and leaving such amazing comments. It means so much to me. 
> 
> This chapter is going to hurt. I'm sorry. I actually cried writing it. But I promise there is a happy ending. Just stick with me. 
> 
> As promised, this chapter isn't as multi POV as the others. 
> 
> Comments are love <3

**Stiles:**

 

It started with a headache. 

A normal every day _‘ugh I don't want to get out of bed and go to school’_ headache. 

A headache that lasted for 2 months. 

A headache that turned into me sleeping almost 15 hours a day. 

A headache that made me so nauseous that even curly fries couldn't make me eat. 

A headache that made me pass out. 

A headache that led to MRI’s and cat scans and vials upon vials of blood being taken from me. 

A headache that led to the words that my father dreaded hearing, even though he was already fooled once into thinking I was sick. 

“It's a brain tumor.”

I laughed. I actually laughed because come on. How fucking hilarious is that? With all the danger I put myself in, all the times I could have died, even when the Nogitsune was possessing me. But no. Cancer. The big C. That's what's going to kill me. 

Just like my mother. 

So there was nothing left to do but laugh. 

And die, I guess. 

I had my Dad tell Scott. Which he did not. My Dad told Ms. McCall and she told Scott. Who told Lydia and Isaac. 

And Derek. 

Derek fucking Hale. 

Who had been gone for a while now, during times when we really could have used his help with his scowling face and crossed arms and eye rolling. No dread doctors or 17th century or however old Beasts could bring him back, but tell him that the scrawny sarcastic kid has cancer and he comes a runnin’. 

I will never understand freaking werewolves.

Some people hover like I’m made of glass and I’m going to shatter into a million pieces at any minute.Some act like nothing's really wrong but there is still that thing in the air that yeah we are in a hospital room for a reason and it's because Stiles is fucking dying. 

And I’m just tired. There is no other word to honestly describe it. I’m tired of everyone looking at me like THAT. You know the look. I’m tired of not being able to eat normal food without puking it up. It's gross. Fucking gross. I’m tired of hurting my dad, yet again. But what I’m really tired of? Is having someone finally, after so long of wanting them to, look at me like I’m the most important person in the world and they’ve realized how in love they are with me, at the most inconvenient time possible. 

It happened with Grace in the 2nd grade. She kissed me on the playground and I went home and told Dad and my mom I had a new girlfriend. When I went to school the next day, I learned Grace had moved away. Well, crap. 

Then Heather. Okay, so maybe she wasn't in love with me but I could have lost my virginity that night with a girl I had been lusting over forever, but no, she died. Which is just so sad not only for my virginity at the time but because she was also one of my oldest friends. 

Then Malia. The timing just was never right with her. When I looked at her like she hung the moon, she just couldn't seem to focus on a relationship with everything else going on in her life. And by the time she had decided yeah, maybe good old Stiles was everything she wanted, that part of me that needed her was gone. 

And then Lydia. 

Lydia Martin. The girl of my dreams. The girl I had my entire life planned out for. 

I waited for so long for her to look at me the way I had always dreamed she would. And I thought, yes this is it, after I saved her from Eichen. But she took her time, healing and trying to figure herself out and if tormenting herself and me with the whole “will we, won't we” dance I could have waltzed through with my eyes closed. 

I sat through Jackson, Aiden, Parrish….and when the moment came...when I thought YES THIS IS IT. LYDIA WILL FINALLY BE MINE...I get fucking cancer. 

And now? I will always wonder did Lydia want me because she wanted ME or because I was dying...or could have died. Who knows what's going to happen. 

And I couldn't live my life like that. Years ago I wouldn't have cared if she really loved me or not. I would have sold my soul or taken the fucking bite for one drunken night with her. But now? Lydia was a real person to me. She wasn't some fantasy. And I couldn't be with her always wondering in the back of my head if we were together for the right reasons. Even if I was going to die and I had a few short months with her. 

So my Lydia dream had died. And I was still tired. 

Cause out of the smoke and ash (no pun intended) here comes Derek Hale. 

And here I am getting radiation that had withered me away to nothing, where I had to shave my head, and not that cute buzzcut thing I had going on when we first met, I mean bald like Charlie Brown bullshit, and I was green and I smelled like vomit most of the time and here comes Derek with hearts in his eyes like I’m the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. 

And the asshole cried. He sat at my bedside, held my hand and cried. And called my dad, SIR. And didn't let me feel sorry for myself. And cuddled me when I was cold. And sat with me when I couldn't sleep and played cards with me or watched reruns of Law and Order at 2am and helped me to the bathroom so I could pee and sometimes didn't make it. He never complained. Never gave me that look of pity or guilt. 

And fuck if I’m tired because now I realize how fucking in love I’ve been with Derek, for who knows how long, and I’m fucking dying of cancer. So no happy ending for Stiles. No crazy werewolf sex for Stiles. No being able to watch Derek laugh and smile outside these four walls of this hospital room. No. 

I’m going to die before any of that happens. 

Yeah, I know. Surgery. Everyone is so fucking optimistic about this god damn surgery. Guess what, assholes? You’re drilling into my fucking skull, removing a tumor the size of golf ball and then ta da everything is fine? Cause yeah, everything always goes in the favor of the Stilinski’s right?

I’m scared, okay? Terrified. I laugh and make jokes and try to keep everyone else around me calm by pretending I’m calm but I don't want to die. I’m not ready. There is too much I haven't done. I want to make my Dad a grandfather. I want to be ‘uncle Stiles’ to Scott’s kids. I wanna see the new Captain America movies. I don't want to die. 

And for some reason, Derek Goddamn Hale is the only one who sees through my little charade. He sees right into my soul and every time I look in his eyes; his worried loving green fucking eyes; I want to cry. I want to unload every stupid thought in my head. And I usually do. At 2am when I’m too terrified to sleep because what if I don't wake up? What if I die even before I can have the surgery. And he is always right there, arm wrapped around me, his wolfy body heat keeping my teeth from chattering. 

“Do you think I’m being punished? That this is my karma for all the bad things I’ve done?”

He turns his head slowly to look at me, averting his eyes away from the Law and Order rerun. 

I watch the kaleidoscope of emotions form behind his eyes before he answers me. He finally takes a small breath. 

“Maybe.”

I nod because he’s being honest. Derek, in his mind, believes the death of his family is his fault. And everything that has transpired since then is a result of all his mistakes. 

“But then again, sometimes I think bad things just happen. I think people get sick and some get better and some don’t. There is no divine plan or greater picture. It's just...stupid human diseases.” Derek finishes. 

“What do you think your punishment was?” I whisper. 

“Boyd and Erica. Their lives for my need for power. My loneliness.” He’s playing with the cord on my IV as he talks. 

“Are you still lonely?”

His eyes lift up to mine. “Not right now.”

“I could die, Derek.”

He nods. “I know.”

“I don't want to.”

“Then don’t.” He shrugs. 

“Cause it's that easy?” I snort. 

“It can be. I’m still alive. I could have...I could be dead. But I fought. You should too.”

“What am I fighting for?”

His lips are so close to mine. I can feel his warm breath on my face. 

I’ve kissed people before. I’ve kissed Lydia Martin. I’ve had sex. 

But this moment, right here, is the most intimate I have ever experienced. 

“What do you want?” I can barely hear him his voice is so soft. 

“I’m honestly not sure anymore.” It's the truth. 

“Then just fight to fight. You’ve been doing well so far.” Derek strengthens his arm around me and I feel him nuzzle, that's right, nuzzle, the side of my bald head.

“What are you doing?”

“You smell like medicine. I’m trying to get you to smell like me.”

I laugh and intertwine our fingers. “What did I smell like before?”

Derek pulls back. “Me. You always used to smell like me.”

I swallow hard. “Oh.”

It's silent between us for a while, I run my fingertips along his biceps over his thin t-shirt and he noses at my head and cheeks a few times. We do this a lot. I call it cuddling. I don't know what he calls it. 

There are a million questions I could ask. There are a million questions I should be asking. But I like having this. I like having this one thing that is mine that no one else knows about or asks about or can concern themselves with. It's just between me and Derek, and if I end up dying, I’ll take it with me like a wrapped up memory for me to cherish. 

I realize in the silence how much I’m cared about. Not just by Scott and my Dad and Lydia. My dad feels like he should be doing more. That if he had just done this instead of that, all of this could have been prevented. That if he had gotten me tested sooner...but it's all just what ifs and blame that is irrelevant and stupid. So I remind him, every single day when he gives me that look, that this is just life. And if I had to go out like Mom, it's okay. Cause I know how to die. Mom taught me. She taught me how to die with grace and with my humor still intact. It's her legacy. And maybe it will be mine too. 

Scott wants to change me. Scott wants to give me the bite, the gift, to save my life. So he doesn't have to go on without me. So he doesn't have to watch me die and think there was something he could have done to save me. Maybe 2 years ago, a year ago, I would have let him. I would have begged him to save my life. And no, I don't want to die. But now, I won't let him. And he’s so angry at me for that. And I can't give him a real reason why I keep refusing. Maybe it's like Derek said. Sometimes bad things just happen and you have to just play the cards you’re dealt. 

I’m loved. And if I do die, I’ll know how much I meant to everyone. And I’m okay with that. 

I wish I had more time. I wish I had more time to get to know this big guy in my bed who has shown me more of his heart in a week than all the years he was here in Beacon Hills fighting at our sides. He’s opened up his soul to me in this bed, surrounded by these 4 walls. His walls have crumbled. All because I’m dying. 

Because he doesn't want to lose someone else. He thinks he’s being selfish. I can see it in his eyes. But Christ, he’s been through enough. Let the guy be selfish. 

“Kiss me,” I whisper. 

His eyes wide and he tenses wrapped around me. 

“Stop thinking. Just do it.”

“Is that your make a wish?” He mumbles. I just smile at him. 

So he does. He kisses me. My lips are chapped and I know I smell horrible and my breath is probably rank as hell. But he presses his mouth to mine and then moves his lips up a bit, his bottom lip getting caught on my top one and I open my mouth slightly just so my tongue can feel the softness of his bottom lip. 

It's the weirdest kiss I’ve ever gotten. 

But it's the most intimate. Just like most things with Derek. 

It doesn't last long and I start to fall asleep minutes later in his arms. My surgery is in the morning. And I have to fight. I have to keep fighting if I want to live. 

“Better than Disneyland,” I whisper before I drift off.

**Derek:**

When the door to the waiting room finally opens, 7 hours after Stiles began his surgery, I stand but don't rush to the front with the Sheriff to meet the doctor. I watch and try to listen, even though I have no right to, as the doctor explains to the Sheriff, Scott, Melissa, and Lydia, about Stiles surgery. 

They removed as much as they could of the tumor. There was excessive bleeding they did not predict and he is going to need another round of radiation to shrink whatever is left of the mass on his brain. What the doctor is the most concerned with is the fact that Stiles’ vitals kept dropping during surgery. And how the swelling will affect him in terms of how long it will take him to wake up. The next 24 to 48 hours are crucial; as they have no idea how Stiles’ quality of life will be until he wakes up. If he wakes up. 

I feel like I’m underwater and when Scott repeats the same words over to me for the second time I still don’t quite understand or comprehend them. 

All I keep hearing is ‘If he wakes up.’

What does that even mean? He’s breathing. He’s fine. He just needs to open his eyes. He just needs to rest and have his brain and everything will be fine. I sit down heavy on the same chair I had made my home all morning and afternoon and look up to find the Sheriff’s eyes on me. He gives me a nod as to say ‘It's okay. It's Stiles. It’s going to be fine’, but I know I show no emotion on my face. No sadness. No worry. Nothing. 

Because it just hit me, and I don't know why because I’ve been with Stiles, I’ve seen how bad he’s been, that he could die. That last night could have been the last time I heard his voice. Or touched him. And I felt the earth under my feet begin to crumble. 

Scott sits down next to me and gives me that concerned puppy look he does so well. 

“Derek, it's Stiles. He’s a fighter. It's gonna be okay.”

I nod, my face still stone cold. 

When ‘visiting hours’ cease for the day, the only two people left are the Sheriff and I. I stay in the waiting room, my hands jittery from all the coffee I had consumed which really does nothing for me but I hadn't really eaten or slept in days so my shaking could be from a number of reasons. 

The Sheriff finds me in the same chair as I was hours before and sits gently down in the one next to mine. 

“I’m gonna go home and get a few hours of sleep. The doctors say if anything changes they will call.”

I nod. But I don't move. 

“They said one person could be in there with him. Why don't you go sit with him for a while?”

I slowly turn my head to look at him and he's giving me a reassuring smirk. “Go on.”

“But…”

“Derek, son. Go. It’s okay.”

I lift myself from my chair at the same time the Sheriff does. He shakes my hand, firmly and I walk, almost zombie-like, down towards Stiles’ room in ICU. The nurse looks at me as if she is about to tell me I can’t, but she closes her lips together firmly and gives me a small nod. 

I scare people. Even to this day. And I’ll never know if it's because they know me; Beacon Hills is still a pretty small town; or because it's their way of flirting. But I don't care. I never did. 

The machines are beeping louder than I am used to hearing them. He looks peaceful; the bandage around his head and IV and heart monitor hooked up to his arm. I take the chair next to the bed; it's still warm from the Sheriff. I swallow as I reach out to run my fingertip along the top of Stiles’ hand. He’s cold. 

I find myself shaking again and I shove my hands between my knees. I can't do this. He’s not talking. He’s not complaining to me about the food and how he wants to take a walk. I should have let him take a walk. I should have done more. 

I should have told him I loved him. 

I should have told him that no matter what I would. That I’d never stop even if…

I can feel the familiar hint of tears threatening to boil up onto the surface. I let them. Who is here to hear or see me anyway? I cry for a long time. I cry for my family and for Boyd and Erica. And I cry for Stiles. I cry for every person in this town that has lost their lives because of werewolves and kanimas and anything else supernatural that found their way here. For the first time in a long time, I hate the wolf in me. I hate that I have all this power and there isn't a damn thing I can do with it to save him. 

I hold his hand as my eyes begin to sag with exhaustion. I hadn't realized how tired I really was. I rest my head on the bed, next to our intertwined hands and let sleep finally take me. 

I stir, I assume hours later because it's still dark out when I lift one eye open to peek at the window. I immediately feel the discomfort in my neck from the position I had fallen asleep in; hunched over in a chair. I lick my lips but don't open my eyes all the way. I’m still just so tired and I’d sleep here until the Sheriff comes back in the morning to sit with his-

I feel the hand under mine twitch and I don't move. I don't turn my head to look at him. I don't move my fingers or any muscle in my body, no matter how uncomfortable I am. When his fingers squeeze ever so gently on mine, I finally lift my head slowly to look. 

He’s staring at me; eyes wide and honey brown. It's the first time in weeks his eyes have looked normal. He looks scared, though. Confused. 

“Stiles...shhh.” I inch closer to him and he squeezes my hand harder. He knows me. His eyes are open and he knows me. He’s holding onto me. “Everything is okay.”

He swallows and I see him try to smile. And I start to cry again. Shit. I’m supposed to be strong. I’m supposed to not be weak for him. He shouldn't see me cry. That was the rule. I was only allowed to break down once. Fuck. 

“S-S-Sour W-Wolf.” He pushes out of his lungs. I blink at him through wet eyes. He’s alive. He woke up. He knows me. He smiles. 

“I love you.” I blurt out. I feel like my heart is about to come out of my chest like some old Bugs Bunny cartoon when one of them falls in love at first sight. I watch as the light that had just been shining behind honey eyes begin to fade and suddenly the machines are screaming and he’s fading. His eyes slide shut and his mouth goes lax and the grip he had on my hand deflates. 

Everything moves in slow motion after that. My eyes as I watch the machine that's monitoring his heart rate gently flatline. As nurses and doctors are yelling at me to move out of the way, to get out, to let them work. As I watch through thick glass the paddles that hit his chest. 

I feel every touch that lands on him. I feel every hand.

His heart isn't beating. 

I know I should call his father. I should call someone. Because I’m useless. I’ve always been useless. 

His heart isn't beating. 

And I’m dying.


	5. Chapter Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _You know the analogy “My heart stops when you look at me”? Or maybe it’s a song lyric? I don’t know, but either way...yeah that’s a real thing._
> 
> Told from multiple POV's of the pack as they all come to realize in their own ways what matters most in this world, what true love really means, and how much the power of that love can overcome when something non-supernatural threatens to take one of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again thank all of you for following this fic and all the lovely kind comments. It means the world to me. I hope you enjoy this chapter. <3

**Stiles:**

You know the saying _“My heart stops when you look at me”?_ Or maybe it’s a song lyric? I don’t know, but either way...yeah that’s a real thing. 

All those cliches about love and how when you find the right person everything just falls into place and they tell you they love you and it’s like the world stops turning and blah blah…

Yeah, that’s all real too. 

Because Derek told me he loved me and I technically died. 

My heart stopped. Like, I flatlined. 

Romantic, huh?

Except when you die and the last thing you see before everything goes black is the scared shitless expression on the man you love’s face. 

And when you wake up from said near death experience...well I guess it wasn't “near”. I did die...and you keep asking for the man you love and everyone just keeps giving you these constipated looks and you know. He’s doing it again.

Derek is blaming himself and any kind of progress you thought he had made when he fled this god awful town, or the progress he had made in this tiny hospital bed with you for a few weeks, went right out the fucking window, got hit by an 18 wheeler and then backed the fuck over again. 

Gone. 

Vanished. 

 

Finito. 

Cause he’s gone. 

And I’m left with the lingering feeling of his lips on mine and the echo of his last words to me before I almost met my maker in the sky. 

“So let me get this straight,” The metal legs of the chair screech across the floor as Danny flops himself into it and stares at me wide-eyed. “He told you he loved you and then you died.”

“Yup.”

“Ouch.”

“Yup.”

“That's like, something out of a TV show.”

I glare at him. 

“Dude, it is! No wonder he took off. He’s freaking out. He thinks he killed you.” Danny literally laughs at my tragedy. 

“I’m aware. It's what he does.” I explain and tug at my IV. 

It had been 2 weeks. 2 weeks since my death experience and I’m doing a lot better. Like a lot. They drained all the excess blood from my head after they got my heart started again and monitored me closely with antibiotics checking my vitals every hour and yeah, I’m okay.

And it's so surreal. 

Like I totally thought I was going to die. 

And like I knew I was. Like seeing Derek’s face and hearing his words seconds before my heart stopped, I felt myself going. I had accepted it. And everything went black and I felt myself fading. But I was okay. I was letting go. 

You know that feeling you have when you’re swimming in the ocean and a wave pulls you under and for a few terrifying moments you can’t hear or see anything you’re trying to swim to the surface to gasp for air and everything is in slow motion? Yeah, that's what it feels like when your heart starts beating again after DYING. You feel like you’re underwater and you hear muffled voices and you want to open your eyes and breathe but you can't...and fuck...it sucks. 

But I’m okay. And everyone is so happy. Like...I can feel the happiness radiating off the people in my life. I have a long way to go; still have to do radiation, still need to take it easy. I’m not completely out of the woods...but I can see through the trees now. 

“Call him.” Danny shrugs. He reaches for my green Jello and I smack his hand. That’s not his. 

“I honestly don't have his number.”

“Where is he staying? Send Scott to go look for him.” 

I’d give anything to just tell Scott, ‘dude, go get my sour wolf.’ But I can't. I’m tired. Even after pretty much beating cancer, I’m still tired. I’m tired of always being the one running after people. I know I should tell Derek a million things. I know I need to remind him, probably every minute for like 2 weeks straight that he didn't kill me. That it wasn't his fault. But, no. I’m not going to. Because I shouldn't have to. I shouldn't be the one all the time being the voice of reason. The one giving all the good advice. The one always fixing everything. 

I have cancer. Well still kinda have it. And for now, I’m done. 

It's Derek’s turn. 

It's his fucking turn.

**Derek:**

You know the saying _“Let it go?”_ Or maybe it's a song lyric. Whatever, that's not the point. The point is I fucking hate that saying. I hate that song, and the movie and everything in between. _‘Let it be’_ can go fuck itself too.

Laura used to say it to me all the time when we were younger. See, I’ve always been a worrier. I’ve always been the one pushing too hard, caring too much. Wearing my heart on sleeve. I was always the one getting my feelings hurt because, as Laura loved to put it, I was unable to ‘Let it go.’

I was never able to then, and I can't now. 

I know Stiles is alive. I was there when they got his heart beating again. I was there when the Sheriff arrived and I was there when Scott showed up too, as he grabbed me by the front of my shirt and slamming me against the nearby wall, screaming in my face, demanding to know what I did. Where was I? Why did I let this happen? He was scared. So was I. I let him throw me around. I let him have the power. He deserved it. 

It was before he knew Stiles was alive. 

When I saw the Sheriff’s face after he came back into the waiting room and I knew Stiles was alive, I left. I never took another look at Scott; I just gave the Sheriff a small nod and that was the last they saw of me. 

I’m a coward, I know. I know it's what I do. I run away. But I was crazy to think Stiles and I could be...anything. 

I came back for the wrong reasons. And I wonder, and it's a fucking awful thought, that did I come back and decide to tell Stiles how I felt because there was the chance he wouldn't make it? That I wouldn't have to work at a relationship and risk him hurting me or me hurting him? That I would have one more thing to blame myself for, to run away from if he died? How fucked up am I? 

And now he’s alive and from what I hear he’s going to be okay. No thanks to me. 

I might still sit outside his room in the middle of the night when he’s asleep (he actually sleeps now) and just watch him. Hey, old habits die hard. I’m still a creeper. Stalker. Whatever the hell else Stiles likes to call me. 

I’m not an idiot. I know why I ran. I don't think I deserve happiness, blah blah. It's a tragic tale. Stiles loves tragic tales. In fact, I think if you lined up a bunch of healthy, level-headed, outgoing, charismatic, successful guys and ONE fuck up, he’d choose the fuck up. Every damn time. He chooses me every damn time. 

But I don't deserve him. And not because I’m fucked up or because I’m a werewolf or because I have no real home or job or whatever the hell else I could think of that actually made sense. No that's not the main reason. I don't deserve Stiles because he’s just...too good for me. He’s pure. And strong. And decent. 

And I’m just...not. I choose power over doing the right thing. I got innocent kids killed because I desperately didn't want to be alone. Isaac left because of everything he lost; his brother, his father, his pack mates, his love. He’s lost it all. But he came back to be there for Stiles. Because Stiles is just so...good, even people who swore they would never step foot back in this town, present company included, come back just to be there. 

So when Ethan shows up at the loft, if there was ever anytime I wanted to laugh it would have been that moment. 

Because this guy lost his brother, his pack, broke up with his boyfriend and here he is, fucking back. What the hell is wrong with all of us?

“Stiles is getting released tomorrow.”

Oh, right. That's what. 

“Why are you here?” I spit out at him. 

“You mean here to see you, or here in Beacon Hills?” Ethan smirks at me and I want to hug him and punch him all at the same time. 

“Both.”

“I’m in Beacon Hills because I still talk to Danny on occasion. He told me Stiles was sick. It was a no-brainer. I came offer support for Danny. Cause you know...it's Danny. I know Stiles would never want to see me, but it's been nice spending time with Danny.” He clears his throat. “And I’m here to see you because no one else will come and tell you what a fucking moron you are.”

I growl at him and he rolls his eyes. “Danny told me everything. Because Stiles told him everything. And Scott is too much of a chicken shit to come talk to you and Danny doesn't know you. And we know you’re not going to man up and go see Stiles so, here I am.”

“And you think anything you say is going to change my mind?” I turn my back to him and go back to….whatever it was I was doing before he got here. Which was nothing. 

“Because I know what it's like to do awful things and think no one would or could ever love you once they knew. It took me leaving Danny to finally tell him everything I had done and you know what? He forgave me. And he loves me.”

“Are you coming back?” I ask gently, my back still to him.

“I want to. But I have no pack. It would take a lot for Scott to accept me into his. But I kinda feel like if I have Danny, none of that matters.” 

I turn to look at the once Alpha. “It's not that easy.”

“Of course, it is. I can't go back. I can't change a damn thing, Derek. I can't bring back the people I’ve killed. I can't right the wrongs I made. But I can move forward. And I can start over. And getting to do that with someone I love? And who loves me? You can't get any better than that.” Ethan slides the loft door open. “You and Stiles have never made any fucking sense. Which is probably why it makes total sense.”

I almost smile. “I hope it works out for you, Ethan.”

Ethan nods, stepping out into the hallway. He pauses, giving me a small nod. “Stop running, Derek. Take it from me. You never end up anywhere.”


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _You know what else is cute?_
> 
> _The fact that I know Derek is still in town but has yet to come see me._
> 
> _Did I say cute? I mean infuriating._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The moment you've all been waiting for! 
> 
> The reunion. These two are such idiots. 
> 
> Again, as always, thank you all so much for all the amazing comments and love.
> 
> Just one more chapter after this one. 
> 
> I LOVE YOU ALL.

  
  
**Stiles:**

My reflection stares back at me and for a moment I almost don't recognize myself. 

My hair's grown back; it's not as long as it was when this all happened but I can put a little gel in the front to get that spikey hipster look that's so in...its still in right? After almost 6 months I just don't know anymore. 

My clothes don’t fall off my small withered frame now as they did when I was first released from the hospital. My old jeans fit perfectly skinny around my legs but pronounce my ass; which in my opinion has always been one of my best features; like they should. My face has some color again; if you call pale white a color. And my cheeks aren’t sunken in like those starving Ethiopian kids I saw on the commercials for 6 months straight when I was on house arrest. 

I look like Stiles again. 

I survived cancer. 

How I will never fucking know. 

Everyone visits. And I mean everyone. Isaac moved back in with Scott and Ms. Mccall. Looks like he's sticking around. Lydia comes by every day and helps me study and do my homework for summer school. I missed graduating with my class. It sucks, but I’ll only need to do one semester of homeschooling; my dad said he’d hire a tutor so I didn't have to attend school with none of my friends there. 

I know Lydia was accepted to like a bajillion colleges but she has not said one word about which one she is attending; if she is attending any of them. 

Scott and Isaac both are going to Beacon Hills Community College. Danny is headed off to Stanford; Ethan in toe. Which as much as I still don’t trust the guy fully, is just too darn cute for words. 

You know what else is cute?

The fact that I know Derek is still in town but has yet to come see me. 

Did I say cute? I mean infuriating. 

Ethan told me he saw him. That he was closed off inside the loft again, doing nothing but frowning and beating himself up about shit that isn't his fault. You know the Derek Hale theme song. We all know it by heart. 

Infuriating. 

So I get my visitors. I do my homework. I play my video games. I go for walks. My Dad even took me with him to the grocery store the other day. With Ms. Mccall. 

I totally think something is going on there. Which I am all for. Like totally. 

But today is a big day. I’m finally allowed to drive my jeep. I’m allowed out of this house without supervision. I am free. 

And everyone is a nervous fucking wreck. 

I don't have any permanent brain injury from the tumor or the surgery or the radiation. I’ve had no seizures, no blood on the brain. In fact, I have a nice pretty scar on my head that has healed perfectly. 

It's almost too good to be true. 

Which is probably why everyone is freaking out so badly. 

Scott doesn't get off work at the Vet until 6. 

Everyone knows where I am going. I promised myself, told myself 24 times a day that when this moment came, I wouldn't go. 

But who the fuck am I kidding?

I need to see him. I need closure. I mean if he was going to stop talking to me...stop...whatever it was he was fucking doing with me, why didn't he go back to where he came from? Why is he still here? Why did he tell me he loved me? Does he love me? I NEED ANSWERS. 

Okay, I’m fine. 

But I need to see him. My Dad gave me that LOOK when I grab my keys out of the bowl on the kitchen counter. He nods at me, cause he knows, they all know, and I sigh heavily.

“I have to do this.”

“I know.” John Stilinski answers. “Whatever happens, just know we can't force anyone to anything they don't want to do. Derek may care about you...but if he’s not ready, you can't force him.”

“I got it. I already know my answer. I just want to say goodbye.”

John nods again and I’m out the door before my Dad can give me any more words of wisdom. 

I could make this ride with my eyes closed but I keep them open for the trip because it's been so long since I’ve been in this part of town. Since I could smell the leaves after a rainshower. Since I've been able to see the sun reflecting through the trees. When you die you begin to appreciate things more than you did before. I never realized how beautiful these woods were. Probably because I was too busy running for my life through them. A lot of bad stuff has happened in these woods. Bad things came out of the preserve…except for one. 

Derek was a good thing. A beautiful, strong, brave, wounded, damaged, stubborn, kind, sweet, grumpy thing. 

And I am on my way to say goodbye to this thing that got thrown into my life by chance and has taken a hold of me like nothing else has. More than Lydia. More than any other girl, or boy, I have ever laid eyes on or that has invaded my life. 

As the woods pass on my left and I get closer and closer to Derek’s loft the more and more I want to turn around and forget the whole thing. I’m okay with unresolved issues. Hell, I live in Beacon Hills where you never really get answers to those things that go bump in the night. I can live with one more thing.

Hell, Derek could be long gone by now. He probably is. Yeah, he went back to the pack he had told me about that he had found. He knew I was going to be okay. There was no reason for him to stay anymore. 

So I decide to do a u-turn in the middle of the back road that pretty much goes through Hale territory and I almost skid the Jeep completely into a tree when I suddenly see Derek standing in the middle of it. Leather jacket in the warm summer air. Eyes glowing that beautiful blue I have grown to love so much. 

I smell the burnt rubber from my tires wift in through my window. My heart is practically coming out of my chest from the adrenaline of almost crashing and the sight of Derek…just standing there. Like that first afternoon all those years ago. 

I open the door to the Jeep gently, not giving a shit if my jeep is cockeyed in the middle of the road. I step out onto the slick asphalt and grip the door tightly to keep myself balanced. I had a whole speech prepared. Now, with Derek 10 feet from me, I have nothing to say. 

“Say something.” I demand after a few minutes. 

Derek remains silent, his eyes now back to their normal hazel color. I really can't see them from where I am; I just know they're not glowing anymore, but I also know just how much green and how much brown are in Derek’s eyes. I could write an entire term paper on them. 

“Say something you asshole!” I scream. It's the first time I’ve raised my voice in almost 9 months. My words echo off the trees and a few birds start to squawk and carry on with my demands. 

“This is private property.” Derek yells back. 

God, I just want to laugh. I want to throw rocks at him. I want to scream until my voice goes hoarse. I want to get back into my jeep and never come back. I want to tell Derek he can go fuck himself. I want to tell Derek how much he’s hurt me. How Derek not being there when I woke up was the like my heart stopping and me dying all over again. That I needed Derek, that I loved him too, and Derek just walked out of my life, again, and I’m not sure it's something I will ever be able to forgive Derek for. I want to tell Derek he is worthy of love because I love him and he needs to stop running because he’s home. He’s home wherever I am. 

But instead I run to him and when Derek’s lips meet mine, I realize that I’m the one who is home.

****

**Derek:**

 

It's not like I didn't know he was able to drive again today. That the shackles were finally removed and he was free to roam as he likes. I had gotten the visit from Isaac, Lydia. All of them. Even Melissa. They all said the same thing. 

“You know he’s going to come find you, right?”

Of course, he was and of course I knew. This was the little persistent kid I had fallen in love with. Of course, he was going to come find me. And part of me wanted to just leave. Do what I do best and disappear without another word. But I couldn't do that. Not this time. 

But I couldn't go see him either. 

He had to come to me. And I know it's bullshit. I know I owe him so much more than that. But he had to make the decision if he wanted to be with me. Telling him I loved him when he was sick was selfish. He wasn't in his right mind or health to decide if he wanted me, even if he got better. He needed to heal. To think. To make his own decision about his future and his heart. 

And it's why I stayed. If he came here today and told me to fuck off, I would. If he came here and told me he loved me I would accept it and we could move forward. But it had to be on his terms. But I know it's something he would never be able to understand. It's not something he would ever be able to forgive me for. No matter how I tried to explain it. 

So that's when I decided I should go to him. 

All that talk I did with myself all those months; waiting and telling myself I was doing the right thing giving him the decision; all went up in flames; no pun intended; when the day came. 

So I started running. 

But this time, I wasn't running from anything like I had been doing ever since my family was killed. This time, I was running toward something. Love. My home. My future. Stiles was it for me. Even if he told me to fuck off, he would always be what I could define as my home. 

So when I heard the Jeep barrelling past the preserve as I ran through my old territory; the sound of his erratic heartbeat syncing with mine; I turned around.

And then he turned around.

There was a change in his heartbeat and I knew he was changing his mind. 

And for a split second; a nanosecond; I considered letting him. Fuck, its what I had been feeding myself all this time. Stiles decision. 

But fuck that. 

In that second I bolted through the woods and into the road. I was about 8 maybe 10 feet from his jeep in the middle of the road, just...fucking standing there. Waiting. Always waiting for him. 

It takes him some time to get out of the Jeep. It takes him a while for him to speak. But he had to do it first. He had to say the first thing to me so I knew what to say. The last words I had spoken to him made him die; I can't make that mistake again. 

So he screams at me to say something. Then he yells it again, this time calling me an asshole. Which I am. In so many ways. And a million options run through my head. But I figure maybe this is a way for us to start over. To forget all the pain. The chaos. The death. It's just us in this moment and maybe, just maybe, we can make everything that's happened disappear. Even if just for a little while. 

“This is private property,” I tell him. 

I half expect him to punch me when he runs to me but instead his mouth is warm and inviting and I wrap myself around him, practically inside him, and I know now that there is a way to start over. Maybe there is no way to erase everything that's happened, but there is a way to make things better. To get through what we’ve both gone through with each other and not have to be alone anymore. 

Stiles is letting me love him. And I’m going to let him love me.

“You’re such an asshole.” Stiles murmurs against my lips. 

“It had to be your decision.” I lie and he laughs in my face. 

“You’re so full of shit.”

“Sorry,” I whisper. 

He nuzzles his nose against mine and lets out a satisfying sigh. 

“Still better than Disneyland.”


End file.
